Mafia meat gangs 'risking public health'

Mafia-like criminal gangs are generating huge profits from illegally trading meat and putting public health at risk, a conference was being told today.

Wales is becoming a centre for the illegal production of smokies, an ethnic delicacy made by using a blow-torch on the skin of a sheep or goat to give a charred flavour, delegates were told at the conference staged in Cardiff today by the Chartered Institute of Environmental Health (CIEH).

It warned that the gangs, which it likened to the Mafia, would put at risk Wales's farming community if left unchecked.

CIEH director for Wales Julie Barratt said: "The illegal meat trade has a stronghold in Wales. Individuals have resorted to meat crime, in particular producing smokies, as a means of supplementing their incomes.

"The foot-and-mouth epidemic of 2001 propelled the dangers of illegal meat on to the national agenda for the first time. Since then some steps have been taken to address the challenges presented by meat crime, but they are not enough."

'Unfit food offence should be created'

Among changes the CIEH wants to see in a bid to tackle the crime is the creation of a specific offence relating to introducing unfit food into the food chain, as well as the introduction of more stringent penalties including instant seizure of the profits of the criminal activity.

The Farmers' Union of Wales has been working with the Food Standards Agency (FSA) and other organisations in a bid to find a legal way of producing smokies.

The illegal trade usually uses older sheep to make smokies, with specified risk material not removed from the carcasses.

A union spokesman said: "If we can find ways of producing them hygienically we think that will kill the illegal trade. We think that is the best way to deal with it. The aim is to drive the gangs out of business."

It is believed that a van-full of smokies could be worth between £5,000 and £10,000, said the spokesman.